Kiwanis Club 
America the Beautiful.....Alaska 1.....Outsiders first discovered Alaska in 1741 when Danish explorer Vitus Johassen Bering sighted it on a voyage from Siberia
2.....Russian whalers and fur traders on Kodiak Island established the first settlement in Alaska in 1784.
3.....In 1867 United States Secretary of State William H. Seward offered Russia $7,200,000, or two cents per acre for Alaska.
4.....On October 18, 1867 Alaska officially became the property of the United States. Many Americans called the purchase 'Seward's Folly'
5.....In 1943, Japan invaded the Aleutian Islands, which started the One Thousand Mile War, the first battle fought on American soil since the Civil War.
6.....Alaska officially became the 49th state on January 3, 1959.
7.....The state of Rhode Island could fit into Alaska 425 times.
8.....Most of America's salmon, crab, halibut and herring come from Alaska.
9.....Dog mushing is the official state sport. The Alaska Legislature adopted it in 1972.
10....Alaska is a geographical marvel. When a scale map of Alaska is superimposed on a map of the 48 lower states, Alaska extends from coast to coast.
11....Alaska is the United State's largest state and is over twice the size of Texas. Measuring from north to south, the state is approximately 1,400 miles long and measuring from east to west it is 2,700 miles wide.
(This concludes this series of information about our 'America the Beautiful')